Ethiopian painting of King Takla Haymanot's war with the Dervishes.

Introduction

In the late 1960s or early 1970s, an American traveller, Joseph Knopfelmacher, acquired an immense and very remarkable Ethiopian painting on cloth that was later purchased by the Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art at the University of Florida in Gainesville. This painting, which is far larger than any known work of its kind, is made up of six pieces of cloth, four large and two small. Together they form a monumental work more than 25' (7.6m) wide and more than 4' (1.2m) high. (1)

This painting (Harn Museum No. 2003.3.3), which is apparently unique, resembles other works of its genre in that it is strictly two-dimensional in character and lacks any attempt at perspective. The size of each figure is thus a function not of his distance from the observer, but of his political, military, or other importance.

The painting is devoted to the grandeur and military prowess of King Takla Haymanot of Gojjam (1847-1901). It features a jihad of the period, which had recently erupted: the Dervish invasion from the Sudan, the Ethiopian monarch's heroic march to war, and the destruction by the enemy of part of the Ethiopian capital, Gondar.

Authorship and Date of Composition

Honoring as it does a ruler of Gojjam, the work may be assumed to have been painted by an artist from that province, which produced some of Ethiopia's leading artists. Indeed, the country's two principal painters specializing in battle scenes in this period both came from Gojjam (see Pankhurst 1989, especially Figures 129-320). One was Alaqa Eleyas of Mota (Pankhurst 2005), the other, Alaqa Heruy of Dima Giyorgis. Both men originated in eastern Gojjam and are renowned for their paintings of the Battle of Adwa of 1896. Either of them may have been responsible for the work--although the possibility that it was produced by another artist cannot be ruled out.

The painting can be dated only approximately. A terminus a quo is provided by the battle, which took place in 1888, but this genre of art was not produced until after the Adwa battle in 1896. A terminus ad quem is suggested by the fact that pennons like those depicted in the painting, which were used only for a short period of time, lost currency around 1897, after which time they tended to be stitched together to form a single flag (Chojnacki 1969:137). If we assume that the artist was drawing from contemporary life, rather than from memory of the past, that would suggest that the painting dates from the last years of the nineteenth century or the first decade of the twentieth.

The Painting and Its Historical Veracity

The greater part of the painting, the left and center of the canvas, is devoted to Takla Haymanot's march to war and focuses on the monarch's court and army. Personalities depicted include the king himself; his consort Queen Laqach, who was a princess from Lasta; his son Ras Bazabeh; and Abuna Luqas, the Coptic head of the Ethiopian Church in Gojjam. The rest of the painting, to the right of the canvas, depicts the fight with the invaders and Gondar in flames.

The work is thus represents the conflict with the Dervishes, which resulted in the disastrous Battle of Sarwaha, in Dambeya, on January 18, 1888. The painter takes artistic license, however, presenting fighting taking place within sight of the Ethiopian capital Gondar, where one of the city's famous castles is seen on fire.

This painting, like so many of its kind, presents Takla Haymanot's war against the Dervishes as a heroic event. As such, it scarcely indicates the extent of the defeat at Sarwaha or the immensity of a disaster in which forty out of forty-seven churches in the Gondar area are said to have been destroyed (Gabre-Sellassie 1975:239). The magnitude of the disaster was later expressed by the Gondar clergy, who, adapting Psalm 76, are quoted as having declared:

   O Lord, the Pagans have invaded
   thy preserve, thy sacred shrine they
   have profaned, Gondar have they
   laid in ruins; they have flung the
   corpses of thy servants to wild birds
   as their food, the flesh of thy followers
   to wild beasts; all round Gondar
   their blood has been poured out like
   water, and there was none to give
   them burial (ibid., p. 240).

The immensity of the defeat is likewise admitted in the Chronicle of Gojjam (see Getahun 1991:236-49). It tells of the Dervishes not only burning down innumerable churches, but also capturing "droves" of prisoners. From among the Christian women, the Muslim leader is said to have "chosen the good-looking ones, and made them his concubines. He slashed the cheeks of the rest ... and sold them off [as slaves]" (ibid., 247-8). Those captured included the king's daughter, Mentewab, who refused to eat Muslim food and in consequence died of starvation. Though glossing over this debacle, the Harn Museum painting is historically--and ethnologically--interesting, for it provides rare and revealing glimpses of traditional Ethiopia.

The March to War, Battle and Personalities Depicted

The central figure in the painting is, as we have seen, that of King Takla Haymanot. He is wearing a characteristic two-tiered Ethiopian royal crown, adorned with three small crosses. A winged angel, upper left, indicates that the monarch enjoys heavenly support. The king wears a large blue cloak almost entirely covered by a rich red lamd, or military cloak, profusely decorated with gold embroidery. In his right hand he holds a straight sword, like those carried by the Sudanese--and which may in fact have been captured then or earlier from them. It presumably has been drawn from the straight, red-and-blue scabbard to his right. In his left hand he holds his horse's reins which are clearly depicted. He is bare-footed, like all Ethiopians of that time (as we know from the reports of contemporary travellers), but wears decorated leggings. The big toe of his right foot fits, in the traditional Ethiopian manner, into a one-toe stirrup. His pale brown horse is finely caparisoned and, like the others in the picture, has an unusually prominent tail. The animal has a blue saddle-cloth and several gold plaques round its neck. Above the horse there is an inscription written in the Ethiopian classical language Ge'ez. With little relationship to history, it reads: "Peace be unto you, O honorable King. You are happy with the power of God. You are the conqueror of the enemy ..."

Takla Haymanot is preceded by one of his principal chiefs. The latter, who is approaching the field of battle, is captioned with his military rank--Dajazmach--but without any name. He too is wearing a gold-embroidered lamd, but of a somewhat darker hue. In his right hand he holds a spear as if ready to hurl it, and in his left a characteristic Ethiopian shield covered in red silk decorated in gold. A slightly curved sword, more typical of Ethiopia than that carried by his liege, is in its scabbard, to the right, and an upright rifle can also be seen top left. His well-caparisoned steed, which has a red, almost orange, saddle-cloth, is slightly darker than that of the king, but has an almost identical toe-stirrup.

A more important figure, captioned "Ras Bazabeh," is Takla Haymanot's son, who is riding immediately behind his father. Wearing a blue cloak embroidered with gold, he holds a rifle in his right hand and a gold-embroidered red shield in his left. He also has a red-and-blue, curved, Ethiopian-style scabbard behind him to the right, which presumably holds a sword. He is riding a white caparisoned charger, with a fine sloping tail, and has one-toe stirrups like those of the other riders depicted.

Beneath the feet of these three figures, we are introduced to the enemy, dead or dying. Seen in profile--the traditional Ethiopian manner of depicting evil persons or enemies of the Christian faith--they are wearing red caps like the rest of the Dervish army. Two of them hold--or were holding--rifles. Two others, apparently still alive, seem to be grasping swords which are, like those of the other Dervishes, straight. One wounded man holds a curious triangular umbrella, smaller and quite different from those of the Ethiopians. Sprawling on the ground, the enemy are being trampled by the horses of the supposedly victorious Gojjamies. An emphatic caption in Ge'ez reads: "As the heathen were exterminated."

Ras Bazabeh is followed by the largest assemblage of soldiers in the whole painting. Their multitude is indicated in the usual manner of Ethiopian painting: row after row of overlapping heads. A few men on the left wear red caps, but the rest are bare-headed. Most are dressed in simple, scarcely adorned red or blue tunics. These are worn over semi-transparent white shammas, or wraps, which reveal the shape of their legs and extend almost as far as their feet. All the men are, as usual, entirely bare-footed. Most are armed with rifles, mainly carried on their shoulders, but at least one has a curved sword, as evident from its scabbard. Several soldiers, right-back, are blowing malakat, or long trumpets, while another, front-left, is beating a sizable nagarit, or drum, carried on horseback. Both instruments are traditionally associated with Ethiopian royalty. Three warriors, left and left-rear, hold staffs, to each of which is attached three pennons, similar to those used in Ethiopia for a short time near the end of the century, but lost currency, as we have seen, by century's end. They are depicted in red, white, and blue, but without any particular order. Painted for artistic effect, their arrangement should not be interpreted as constituting a specific national or even regional flag.

Immediately behind this large group of soldiers rides Abuna Luqas, the chief ecclesiastic of Gojjam. A highly honored figure, he was one of four Egyptian Coptic prelates sent from Alexandria in 1881 through the initiative of Emperor Yohannes IV (c. 1831-1889). Luqas, who is the only bearded figure in the entire picture, wears a flowing blue cloak and, in a style then not uncommon among prelates, a shamma round and above his head. He rides a light brown caparisoned horse with a red and particularly long ornate saddle-cloth that covers almost his entire steed. He is flanked in front by a guard holding a rifle, while an attendant behind him holds a decorated blue umbrella above his head, and a paternissa, or pastoral staff. This elaborately fashioned object, now largely forgotten in Ethiopia, represents a two-headed snake winding itself around a rod. This recalls Numbers 21:9, where Moses "made a serpent of brass and put it upon a pole."

Behind the prelate rides Takla Haymanot's consort, Queen Laqach. She is captioned as "Negest Wayzaro Laqach," i.e. Negast, the regal title of queen, followed by that of Wayzaro, a title then generally applied to princesses and woman of high status. The use of both terms is interesting in that it indicates the importance then attached to the word wayzaro, which is today merely the equivalent of "Mrs." Laqach has beautifully braided hair, with a decorative hair-pin, and wears a wide, red-bordered shamma which, in a fashion common to many Ethiopian women, discretely muffles her face and neck. She has a blue cloak, like that of the Abun, with a wide gold border. She rides bare-foot on a dark brown caparisoned horse which has a highly decorated red saddle not dissimilar from that of the Abun. Like that cleric, she has an honorific umbrella, in her case red, held over her and is flanked by a guard holding a rifle.

Immediately behind the queen and near the left edge of the painting rides a second noblewoman. She is almost certainly a princess, as indicated by her ornate blue and gold cloak, which resembles that of the queen, and honorific blue umbrella, virtually identical to that above the Abun. A caption beside her is, however, indecipherable. She has braided hair, like the queen, but her face is unmuffled. We therefore see her entire face and most of her neck, which is decorated with a necklace. She rides on a white caparisoned horse and, like the Abun and the queen, is flanked a little in front by a guard holding a rifle. Behind him, to the left and at the very edge of the picture, is another group of followers, once again indicated by overlapping heads, and above them a further umbrella.

The far right of the picture, devoted to Takla Haymanot's conflict with the Dervishes--the culmination of the drama depicted in the painting--constitutes a classical Ethiopian battle scene. As in other such representations, notably those of the Battle of Adwa, the two armies are seen facing each other, man against man and rifle against rifle. The Ethiopians, as is traditional in this genre, are placed on the left and, like good people and followers of the faith in the country's classical religious paintings, shown in full face. By contrast, the Dervishes are painted in profile, with one eye, like evil people or enemies of the faith, who are without exception painted in profile in traditional Ethiopian painting.

The Ethiopian force, commanded from the rear by a chief captioned as "Dajazmach Kidana Maryam," is considerable. The massed army is once again indicated, top and center-right, by row after row of overlapping heads. These men consist almost entirely of riflemen. They are for the most part kneeling. Bare-headed and bare-footed, they wear a variety of red or blue cloaks with white trousers. One man nearest the enemy holds a shield, while the most visible soldiers--mostly those in the front--are seen taking aim. The convention of depicting Ethiopian Christians only in full face, with two eyes, leads to some awkwardness in the artist's execution.

Above the Ethiopian force is one of the most curious features of the painting: a framed rectangular device containing a representation of two cannons on wheels. Weapons of this kind were then apparently in limited use. An adjacent caption in Ge'ez reads, "As the soldiers of the king fought in the city of Rome," an allusion which it has not been possible to identify. On the right of the battlefield we see the enemy--the Dervishes. They are also armed mainly with rifles. Above them are two sets of three pennons, blue, red, and white, and white, red, and blue. These are virtually identical to those of the Ethiopians, and would not appear to be drawn from reality.

The Dervishes differ from the Ethiopians in that they are standing rather than kneeling. Their dress is also quite different, for they all wear red caps and their red or blue belted tunics are short. The greater part of their legs is thus in most cases visible, revealing that they are dressed in long white, red, or blue trousers. The leading Dervish, brandishing a spear, is distinctive in that he is wearing yellow slippers, the only shod figure in the entire painting. Two of his comrades, dressed in blue, carry red leather scabbards, which are entirely straight, and thus different from the curved swords of the Ethiopians.

In the middle of the battlefield, between the two armies--as in other Ethiopian paintings of battles--stands one lone Ethiopian hero, whose presence adds an element of drama to the scene. Dressed in a lamd and long, tightly fitting trousers, he brandishes a characteristically curved sword in his right hand and in his left an Ethiopian-style shield, with which he bravely staves off the spear wielded by the leading Dervish. Beneath the hero lie the dead: four Ethiopians--presumably symbolic of many more--depicted full-face, to the left, and about as many Dervishes, in profile, to the right.

The tragic outcome of the Dervish incursion is depicted on the far right of the painting. There, behind the enemy, we see a battlemented building, clearly intended to represent one of the Gondar castles, on fire. Red flames belch forth from its roof and both its upper and lower windows. A caption below the building, possibly alluding to 2 Chronicles 28 ("he ... burnt his children in the fire"), reads, "As he was burnt with his children."

Behind the burning castle, almost at the right-hand edge of the painting, below an illegible caption, we see a further force of many Dervishes, armed with rifles, watching the conflagration. One, front right, rides a camel, which was symbolic as the principal means of transportation in the Sudanese lowlands from which the Dervishes came. Such animals could well have been taken to the battlefield. Behind it are depicted two cannons, both on wheels, with yet another undecipherable caption.

The painting, though intended to glorify Takla Haymanot rather than to provide an "authentic" picture of the conflict, thus illustrates many typical aspects of Ethiopian life of the period--dress, horse decorations, weaponry--and presents a valuable artistic commentary on its time.

I am greatly indebted to Dr. Rebecca Nagy, Director of the Harn Museum, for drawing my attention to the Ethiopian painting in question, and to Harn Museum registrar Mary Margaret Carr, registration assistant Jill Brougher, and graduate research intern Jaime Baird, for providing me with photographs and measurements of it. Thanks are also due to Professor Amsalu Aklilu, of Addis Ababa University, for translating the Ge'ez passages, a few of which are unfortunately almost indecipherable.

[This article was accepted for publication in July 2005.]

References cited

Chojnacki, S. 1969, "A Second Note on the Ethiopian National Flag." In Proceedings of the Third International Conference of Ethiopian Studies. Addis Ababa: Institute of Ethiopian Studies.

Gabre-Sellassie, Zewde. 1975. Yohannes IV of Ethiopia: A Political Biography. Oxford, Clarendon Press.

Getahun, Girma Y. 1991. The Goggam Chronicle. D. Phil. thesis, Mansfield College, Oxford.

Pankhurst, Richard. 1989. "The Battle of Adwa (1896) as Depicted by Traditional Ethiopian Artists." In Proceedings of the First International Conference on the History of Ethiopian Art, pp. 78-103. London: The Pindar Press.

--. 2005. "Menilek's Court Artist; Alaqa Eleyas." In Ethiopian Art and Architecture, ed. Rita Pankhurst, pp. 237-42. Lawrenceville, NJ: Red Sea Press.

Notes

(1.) The overall dimensions of the painting are approximately 4' 2 1/2" (1.3m) in height by 25' (7.6m) in width. The work is painted on six pieces of plain white cloth, four along the bottom and two along the top. The lower ones, from left to right, measure respectively 118" by 23" (300cm x 58.4cm), 38" by 22 1/2" (96.5cm x 57cm), 149" by 26" (378.5cm x 26cm), and 7 1/2" by 25 3/4" (19cm x 65.4cm). The two upper pieces measure 138" by 23" (350.5cm x 58.4cm) and 163" by between 22 1/2" and 27" (414cm x 57-68.6cm). Accurate measurement is difficult, for the various pieces of cloth have irregular edges and overlap each other to varying degrees. The total width of the canvas is approximately 312 1/2", or 26' 1/2" (7.9m), at the bottom, and 301", or 25' 1" (7.7m), at the top.